BACK ON THE ROAD
Kate Ceberano is bringing four decades of hits when she heads North as part of her Sweet Inspiration tour
For Kate Ceberano, life after Covid is like a trip back to the 80s. The Australian pop, soul, jazz singer said she loved having regular work again. “People are loving going to gigs again,” Ceberano said.
“When we do these intimate gigs people really enjoy the chatting between the songs, it’s as though they haven’t had anyone in their loungeroom talking to them for months, it’s all been Netflix.
“I’m treating it like it’s 1980. It’s the deconstruction of our universe as we know it.
“We’re living this really basic life, things aren’t as fast as they used to be but we still get there.
“People are so grateful to be at a gig … they want the entertainment experience they missed.
“They want to be entertained and I am happy to oblige!
“It’s just a great relief to be working to be honest. I’m thrilled.”
Ceberano said there had been a definite change in her music from lockdown to living free.
“I was trying to give people some peace and try to give them something to focus on that would get them through tough times but now that we’re out and about it’s like all of the songs sound like liberty day,” she laughed.
During Melbourne lockdowns, Ceberano recorded her 28th album, Sweet Inspiration – the fastest album she has made.
And she admits she thought it might be her last.
Ceberano recorded Sweet Inspiration in just two days in 2020.
“There was an air of uncertainty in the studio,” Ceberano said.
“I was thinking ‘Could this be the last one?
This could be the last opportunity we get to record something like this for the longest time’.
“It had so much weight to it. It felt like we were wading through honey.
“Everything seemed so much harder to do – from simply getting into a studio to record in, to how many people could stand in the booth.
“The whole thing feels like it was shot in black and white in my head.”
Sweet Inspiration sees Ceberano mix mainstream classics I Will Always Love You, I Honestly Love You, You Needed Me and The Long and Winding Road with songs by Paul Weller, Elbow and Leonard Cohen, and her two originals written mid-pandemic – Hold On and Sweet Inspiration.
“It’s a very, very diverse but loving selection of songs I personally listen to, plus also the bucket list from the record label,” Ceberano said.
“They wanted to put me back in there as a bit of a diva.
“To me and my taste, I was curating an album – showing that a great romance doesn’t exist in a generation of time, it exists within us all.
“Each of us has a different way of expressing
People are so grateful to be at a gig … they want to be entertained and I am happy to oblige
it.
“On the album there’s some of the greatest songwriters of all time showing us how deep they love, love life, love each other, love themselves.
“None of us were obviously expecting Covid to hit, and they let me put two of my originals on it, because it seemed so incredibly weird to be making that kind of record in that time and not reference it somehow.”
Ceberano said the swift recording deadline added to the intensity.
“I was singing 10-hour days two days in a row to get it all done,” she said.
“They’re all live versions, old-school style. By the time we got to (Leonard Cohen’s) If It Be Your Will I had spent all the fuel in the tanks, I didn’t care any more if it was going to be beautiful or ugly, but it was going to be honest.”
Ceberano said her Townsville show would be all of her hits from across the years.
“It’s four decades worth of my work - it ages me to tell you this - all the hits across four decades so that’s like four different types of people I’ll be bringing up on stage with me,” she said.
Ceberano is brining new guitar sensation Kathleen Halloran for her Townsville show and said for anyone who had even a passing interest in guitar, it would be worth seeing Halloran live. Kate Ceberano – Sweet Inspiration Tour is at the Townsville Entertainment and Convention Centre on July 9. Tickets from ticketek.com.au/tsvboxoffice
Queensland
Country Bank’s recent Business Banking Function, held at the Hutchinson Builders Centre, provided guests with an exclusive behindthe-scenes tour of the high performance centre and training areas.
North Queensland Toyota Cowboys Head of Football, Micheal Luck, spoke of the importance of developing a high performance culture in a professional sporting organisation, and how business owners can adopt this strategy within their own organisation.
Queensland Country Bank CEO Aaron Newman also provided an update on the organisation’s ongoing commitment to developing business banking products and services to help members reach their financial goals.
Queensland Country Bank’s Business Banking function
with